I have a CMS which i made with PHP and i want to add some self updating features to it.
A self updating system can be a complex and tedious thing, i know that, but that's a whole different story. The bottom line is is that i end up creating new PHP files, editting existing ones with new code and probably deleting some PHP files when an update happends.
I know how to read, write and delete files in PHP, but this almost always gives me problems on a Linux server when i don't chmod the folder with an FTP client first to 0777.
I also know PHP has chmod and chown functions. But most of the times these functions don't work for me either. Mainly because all the PHP files are uploaded through FTP which gives the rights to write to files and folders to the FTP group (or something like that).
I also have a Wordpress blog installed on a Linux server, but for some reason this Wordpress site has no trouble updating itself. I assume it does the same things i said; create, update and delete certain files. But none of the Wordpress sites i ever worked with complained that it couldn't update itself because of the folder/file permissions.
So i'm guessing Wordpress uses a smart way to change folder permissions when needed. I just couldn't figure out how.
So basically my question is, what is the best way to give PHP permissions to chmod files and folders on a Linux system? How does a system like Wordpress handle this?
You can set the folder to 0777 which would give PHP the capability to create files inside of it. You can also chown the folder to www-data or whatever your copy of PHP runs as...
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I have plans on making a generator GUI, accessible on a route while in development mode. When taking some action in the GUI it will create or update corresponding files in the project folder. This means the web server user need permissions to handle the files.
What is a good way to accomplish that? I have thought of a few approaches but not sure.
After you pull in my package, let the user chmod everything themselves. This might be an issue as these changes will be committed to source control
Add some kind of installer script that you can run with sudo to do 1) for you.
Add a temporary workfolder for the generator where it has full access. Then you set up some symlink thing to the actual project folder so it stays in sync. That way you won't have the Git issues.
I am excited to hear what you think about this.
I am trying to install Joomla 3.2 using the host provided by my university. So, I have available one mysql database with the username and pass and the ftp username and pass to transfer data, only. That is, no Cpanel installed or ssh available.
If I extract the file Joomla_3.2.0-Stable-Full_Package.zip and ftp the contents on the website, the owner of these files/folders is user "ftp_username". I can continue to install Joomla only if I set-up the ftp layer.
This works, except I get from time to time messages like --> JFTP: :rename: Bad response Rename failed More specifically I get this message when using kunena.
Moreover, I read online that the FTP layer shouldn't be used normally. Also, the tmp/cache/logs create permission problems.
If I remove the ftp layer (by editing the configuration.php) then I cannot modify anything since Joomla cannot modify the files (owned by ftp_username). Of course, I could change all permissions to 777, but that would be suicide...
I found a post explaining a bit the situation I'm here! Especially the advice on using "chmod 4770" is feasible but I don't know about how secure it is (haven't tried it).
Anyone has an idea how I can make this work?
cross-posted here
Thanks in advance
I found a way to bypass this problem. Not worth it if you have an alternative provider!
I installed joomla with ftp layer
I installed Extplorer plugin
Used plugin to upload Joomla_3.2.0-Stable-Full_Package.zip on the server. Now the file is owned by the apache user.
Deleted all the (joomla installation) files on the server except the zip file
Uploaded a php script to unzip the file using php (http://php.net/manual/en/ziparchive.open.php). The installation folders/files are now owned by apache user
Reinstall Joomla without the ftp layer.
I guess I could have used some php uploader script instead of steps 1-4, but I already had Joomla installed with the ftp layer.
That's it. Up and working. If you have an alternative provider, don't bother.
It seems to me that the hosting option provided by the university may be too restrictive to work for pretty much any CMS. You need to be able to chmod and potentially chown all your files in bulk so as to avoid insanity.
There may be an FTP program out there that will chmod your files as you are uploading them. If your group is www-data or whatever group apache needs, then you can 775 your folders and 664 your files; you should be good to go.
I am working on a web app that needs read/write access to an SQLite database file. As I understand it, the parent folder needs to be set to 777 in order to be able to open the database with PHP (source).
What are the recommended file permissions for the .db file itself? Bear in mind that I need to be able to overwrite the file with PHP as well.
Furthermore, are there any security risks with the database if its parent is 777? The folder is created by PHP. I'm just trying to make sure I can get work done without creating security risks.
Thanks!
You should have Apache (the web server) own the folder.
Or maybe create a group like www-dev consisting of MySQL and Apache and then set the folder group to www-dev and the permissions to 770 .
Just don't make the folder public with 777 - specially on a shared server.
im doing a php project. all is fine doing it in xp webserver which im using iis..but now i have set up a new pc with windows 7 and iis.
problem is when i copy my php files which is in a folder(e.g portal1) from the xp wwwroot to the windows 7 wwwroot, i cant access it on the browser. it returns an internal server error.
now i assumed i didnt properly set up my web server or even php. i have done it a dozen times following tutorials and im pretty sure its all correct.
i have done a further research on the folder itself and has led me to a theory that this has to do with permissions.
when i copy directly the whole thing,it wont run, BUT if i CREATE a folder and the subfolder with all the same names as the one i copied and just take the php files and put it accordingly, it runs ok!!
now that has something to do with inherited permission i think. how do i overcome this?
i dont want to everytime take the updated work folder from my partner which is done in xp and i have to create new folder and its subfolder with all the same name on my machine and then copy the php files accordingly. thats a lot of work!!
i just want to copy the folder and put it in my wwwroot folder and run it on the browser without problems. how do i overcome this permission issue?
any ideas?
By the sounds of things, you're working on a project with someone else. Copying & pasting is the absolute worst way of sharing files when working on a project with multiple people. You should really be using versioning like git. That's pretty hard to set up and learn though. An easy solution which will work for the time being (but won't manage conflicts well) is to use Dropbox. Set up a free Dropbox account, and create a folder in that called www or whatever you want. Then install WAMP (way better than IIS), and create an alias to the www folder in your Dropbox. Do this on both machines. Now every time your partner makes a change, it will be instantly reflected on your machine, and vice versa. Easy, free, and will work while you learn a versioning tool.
I know this doesn't address your actual problem, but it should be more helpful to you.
I've been trying to come up with a way to build an automatic update system for a cms that I'm building that will potentially be installed on numerous servers (likely with different configurations). What I've come up with is to keep a current version uploaded to my server in a predetermined directory. Then have the distributed systems check that directory (on a remote server) once every so often to see if a new version has been uploaded. If the version number of the uploaded version is greater than the one that particular system has, it will prompt the admin to update. Then the files will be copied via FTP into a tmp directory, then will be copied from tmp to replace the older versions of each file. then the tmp directory is deleted, and the systems version number is increased.
THe problem with this, is that I haven't found a way to transfer whole directories via PHP FTP. I know I can zip it and transfer it that way, but I haven't found a reliable way to unzip files in various server environments.
I know I can write my own method that will just go through each directory and transfer over each file one at a time, which is fine. I just wanted to know if someone else had already written something to this effect, or if someone knew of an alternate solution to this problem before I dive into it.
Thanks for your help!
Instead of sending a directory, why not zip the folder to save bandwidth and time? Then unzip on the destination servers. deleted since it was not an option for the OP
You could use PHAR archives for your app deployment (if you want to be bleeding-edge modern)
Or you could write an update script for Phing that gets the files from your server. You could even do checkouts from SVN then, instead of placing the build in a directory.
Try using exec() to run lftp from the command line:
/usr/bin/lftp -e 'o ftp://ftp.example.com/path/to/remote/directory && mirror --verbose && quit'